A tooth, a kneecap, arm and finger bones ... as well as a shoulder blade.

It's St Andrew's Day - the national saint of my homeland, Scotland.  But lest we forget it's useful to remember we share this patron saint with,

• Amalfi,
• Barbados,
• Cyprus,
• Diocese of Paranque in The Phillipines,
• Diocese of Victoria in Canada
• Greece,
• Luqa in Malta
• Manila,
• Romania,
• Russia,
• Siciliy and
• Ukraine;

not to mention fishermen, fishmongers and rope-makers the world over.

According to legend the relics of St Andrew housed in St Mary's Cathedral, Edinburgh include a tooth, kneecap, arm, finger bones and a shoulder blade.  The Saint's head is in Patras, Greece (along with the cross on which he was crucified) apparently.  And an unspecified set of relics of the saint is housed in the Crypt of St Andrew in Amalfi Cathedral.  Go figure.

SCOTLAND - the official internet gateway to the country offers these "ten fascinating facts about St Andrew."  

Here's fact 4:

In 832 AD Andrew is said to have appeared in a vision to a Pictish king the night before a battle against the Northumbrians in what is now the village of Athelstaneford in East Lothian. On the day of the battle a Saltire, an X-shaped cross, appeared in the sky above the battlefield and the Picts were victorious.

Fact?  

An X-shaped cross appeared in the sky the day after a vision of Andrew the Apostle appeared to the king.  Pardon my scepticism but I think we're stretching the definition of the word fact almost to breaking point.  But here's a less dubious fact.  I used to live a couple of miles from Athelstaneford.  Nice wee place.

Statue of St Andrew by Camillo Rusconi in the Vatican